And the Consciousness of Loving
by The Black Sun's Daughter
Summary: Ezekiel calls her Mama Baird when he thinks he's being funny, and she'll call them her kids when she's teasing them. But they're not really her children, she's not really their mother, and she has no right to poke around their personal lives. But nobody can stop her from worrying about them. She's their Guardian. It's her job, after all.


She tries not to pry. Really, she does try. Eve calls them her kids, and when Ezekiel thinks he's being funny, he'll call her Mama Baird (once out of swatting distance, of course), but she isn't actually their mother, and they're not actually her children. They're all adults, and she has no right to go digging around in their personal lives.

But she does worry. Can't do anything about that. She isn't their mother, but she _is_ their Guardian. That means it's her job to protect them, even from themselves. Like after the case in Oklahoma, when Jacob insisted he was fine, but she found him fall-over drunk in a bar the next night. Or when Ezekiel laughed and said there was _no way_ he did all that stuff in the time loop, but Karys heard him and Zhu whimpering over in a reading nook in the grip of a full-tilt panic attack. Or after Cassandra's tumor got worse and the redhead promised she could handle it, but she noticed that Cassandra started wearing _the_ look for a while after, _the_ look that she'd seen on fellow soldiers that were thinking about eating a bullet. The Library's picked her for the job of looking out for these three, and she's got her work cut out for her.

So, she worries.

Which is why she's debating whether or not she should go looking for them before she goes home.

Their latest case has been a complete, Grade-A, top-shelf cluster that'd gone FUBAR in the most spectacularly awful fashion. The Clippings Book sent them to a primary school in Bulgaria where a nest of vampires were snatching kids. Vampires couldn't have kids once they were turned, so if they wanted kids after that, they'd have to steal someone else's. Which they did. The four of them spent the next three days playing hide-and-go-seek in the miles upon miles of abandoned tunnels that honeycombed underneath the city. And in that time, the vampires decided that the kids were more trouble than they were worth. Of the seven snatched kids, only two went home intact. Two had already been turned, and the other three...

Sometimes, she really hates this job.

Karys drops his heavy head onto her thigh, and she automatically runs her fingers through his thick fur, scratching behind his ears. "Come on, Evie." He's the only one that gets to call her that other than her father. "We'll check on them one more time, and then we go home," he insists, sounding as weary as she feels. Adrenalin's kept them all going this far, but it doesn't change the fact that she's gone almost sixty hours without sleep at this point.

"All right." Home sounds good. She needs a bed. And a Flynn. But she knows her dæmon is right. She needs to check on them at least once before she goes or she'll worry about it instead of sleeping, which is what she needs to do.

So Eve gets up, feeling her bumps and bruises protesting that action, and shuffles into the stacks, heading down the corridor that holds the rooms. Insofar, her charges have been living in the Library, since none of them have their own flats in the city yet. Eve only has her own place due to the fact that she and Flynn are sharing the rent. Ten years as a Librarian with no real downtime, he's got plenty of pay stored up.

Jenkins is walking down the corridor, holding a clipboard and murmuring to himself; Menerva is flying overhead, apparently counting doors. Eve doesn't question it. They have a Chupacabra that makes beef jerky, who is she to question? She opens her mouth, but before a word comes out, Jenkins points down an adjoining corridor. "Third door on the left, green paint," he says, never looking away from the clipboard. "Miss Cillian went in a half-hour ago."

Karys huffs a soft laugh as she turns down the hallway. They can never say that Jenkins doesn't pay attention. She finds the green door on the left and knocks lightly. "Cassandra? You awake?" Eve calls, pitching her voice just loud enough to carry through the door. If Cassandra's asleep, Eve doesn't want to wake her. They all need rest.

No answer. Eve debates just leaving it at that, but Karys nips her hand knowingly. She tries the knob, and it turns. She'll just peek, that's all. Just so she _knows._ She's so tired at this point that she doesn't even argue with herself about being a worrying mother. Praying the hinges don't squeak, she eases open the door slightly and tilts her head to glance in the room.

Eve blinks, then opens the door the rest of the way like that'll help clear her vision.

All three of her Librarians are asleep on the bed.

They're lying atop the covers, still dressed. It looks like the only thing they managed to take off is their shoes. At first, she almost doesn't see Ezekiel at all, given that he's practically underneath Jacob, face buried in his shoulder; he's perilously close to the edge of the bed, but the arm and leg that Jacob has thrown over him keeps him anchored in place. Cassandra is lying on the historian's other side, fitted neatly up against his back with her arm over his waist. By necessity, her hand is resting against Ezekiel, too, fingers curled loosely in his jumper. She's just a little shorter than Jacob, so her head rests on his back just between his shoulders. On the bench at the foot of the bed, their dæmons are a similar knot of fur. In emulation of their humans, all she can see of Zhu is the white tip of a fluffy tail and the black nose of a pointy muzzle, poking out from underneath Addy. Asten is curled up right against Addy's side with his snout tucked in the thicker fur around her neck, their dappled coats almost blending into each other, his long, stripy tail twitching slightly in dreaming.

Eve steps back and closes the door softly. Her mind presents her with one of those clear, abrupt thoughts that only appear when she's too tired to mentally argue about it. This is not a new thing, and this is not a casual thing, either. Nobody lets another person's dæmon that close unless they're more than friends. Karys has never objected to proximity from other dæmons, but only Loquis gets to snuggle in his thick fur or sleep curled up on his back. And Eve knows from personal experience it takes a while to get used to sleeping in a bed with another person, to adjust to all the extra limbs, to know how someone moves around in sleep. But they look entirely comfortable where they are, resting against each other just right, dæmons curled up snugly. They've been together for weeks, maybe even months. Suddenly, a thousand little differences resolve themselves in her mind. Little glances that weren't always there, little touches that hadn't always been so natural, a new ease to their working together. She'd contributed it to simple familiarity, having worked together so long now, but she's clearly a little off the mark.

And just as quickly as her surprise fades, relief surges up to take its place. Relief because she's not the only one looking out for them anymore. Now they have each other, and she knows that love can be a vicious motivator if ever there was one. People like to think that love is soft, but Eve knows from first-hand experience that it's not. It's strong, strong enough to make even reality bend around it.

"Well, then," Karys says, leaning against her leg. His voice is casual, but his tail is thumping the floor rapidly.

She reaches down and ruffles his ears with a soft laugh. "Well, then," she repeats, a smile in her voice. "C'mon, let's go home."

* * *

Jake Stone—Adrasteia, called "Addy," Siberian lynx  
Cassandra Cillian—Asten, common genet  
Ezekiel Jones—Zhu, red fox  
Eve Baird—Karys, Siberian husky/grey wolf mix  
Jenkins—Menerva, snowy owl


End file.
